Mystical Beauty

Today I came across a wonderful interview with my favorite midwife, Ina May Gaskin, along with her husband, Stephen.  If you don't know who they are, let me give you the short version: they were part of the group that founded the Farm in Summertown, TN.  It was a hippie-commune (they called themselves "technicolor Amish") that has now evolved into a self-sustaining community that serves as a hub for all things natural health.  The midwives at the Farm are known the world over and have some of the best safety rates in the maternal health business (Example: their cesarean rate is 1.7 percent versus the US cesarean rate of 34 percent). 

Anyway, in this interview, Mr. and Mrs. Gaskin talk about all manner of things surrounding her midwifery practice at the Farm, but what really stuck out to me was something she said when describing laboring moms.  She said that women who are laboring unmedicated have a kind of "mystic beauty."  She then went on to say that when doctors see what they are denying women of by overmedicating and overmedicalizing birth, they will learn to get out of the way and let the woman's body work. 

After going through my last birth experience, I have to say that I have to agree.  My incredibly supportive mother-in-law, Sandy, who admittedly didn't know very much about unmedicated birth up until now, told me last week that if she hadn't been in the room to see it, she wouldn't have believed it could be done so peacefully and powerfully.  Women all over the US are in the same boat, especially moms-to-be.  If I had a dime for every woman that I talk to that tells me she is "terrified" of giving birth, I'd unfortunately be a very rich woman.  Because of modern-day media and an alarmist medical community, American women are just plain uninformed about what birth is really like and what their bodies are capable of.  It breaks my heart to see fellow women being robbed of knowing their own powerful woman-strength.

In the interview I mentioned, Ina May says that up until the mid-twentieth century (starting with President Carter's generation) babies were born at home.  My grandmother was born at home.  She is now 82.  Now, don't hear me wrong -- I'm not saying every baby should be born at home.  I had unmedicated hospital births.  I have lots of friends who had wonderful, perfectly safe home births.  Choose what is right for you and your little one.  What I'm ultimately saying is that natural, unmedicated birth, no matter where, isn't an unattainable concept.  I am no martyr or superhuman for doing it.  I simply believed in my body's innate wisdom and trusted that it knew how to have this baby just like my great-grandmother did when she had my Nanny at home 82 years ago (By the way, that same great-grandmother's name was Cora -- how cool and full-circle is that?!). 

So I suppose I say all that to encourage you and say that your body, too, is wise and capable.  Don't doubt it.  There is a "mystic beauty" inside of you just waiting to come out. 

If you'd like to watch the interview with Stephen and Ina May Gaskin, see it HERE.